U.S. Sources Confirm: RQ-170 Crashed in Iran

U.S. Sources Confirm: RQ-170 Crashed in Iran: It was indeed a stealthy RQ-170 Sentinel that crashed in Iran, say U.S. Air Force officials with connections to the intelligence community. Iran says it was shot down. U.S. intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance specialists say the flying wing broke contact with its ground station and subsequently crashed.

The question of interest now is whether the U.S.-owned unmanned reconnaissance aircraft are regularly flying missions along Iran’s border looking into Iran to monitor missile tests and other activities or whether they are penetrating to look more closely at missile test facilities and nuclear weapons operations.

The latest confirmation differs from earlier reports in that those said it was “possibly” or had a “50-50 chance” of being the Lockheed Martin aircraft. All comments also indicate that there was no doubt about U.S. government aircraft being in Iranian airspace.